KATHMANDU, July 12: The locals in Sundarijal, which remains as a major area for water storage and supply in the Kathmandu Valley, is itself struggling to address acute need of drinking water.
Though water from the Melamchi River in Sindhupalchowk is fetched and processed at Sundarijal before supplying to the Kathmandu Valley, many settlements in Gokarneshwor and Kageshwori Manohara Municipalities do not have access to regular drinking water supply. As a result, they have to rely on traditional stone taps, wells and public taps for the waters.
Although locals and their representatives at the federal parliament continue to draw the government's attention to this pressing issue, it has remained unsolved as of now.
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In a meeting of the Infrastructure Development Committee, House of Representatives, last week, Rajunath Pandey, a people's representative from Kathmandu Constituency-3 warned that they would obstruct the supplies of water to the capital city if the water shortage in the Gokarneshwor was not addressed.
On Saturday, he arranged a meeting with representatives of Kathmandu Upatyaka Khanepani Limited (KUKL) at the water treatment centre in Sundarijal. During the meeting, he sought their necessary initiatives to address the issue.
Melamchi water is brought to Sundarijal through a 27.5-km tunnel from Helambu Rural Municipality-1 in Sindhupalchowk and processed before distributing to the capital.
In addition, water from the Bagmati River is also treated at Sundarijal and supplied to various areas in the valley. However, despite living near the water source, locals continue to be deprived of a regular drinking water supply.
According to Sabitra Sapkota of Kageshwori Manohara Municipality-3, they are forced to walk for about half an hour on a regular basis to the public tap in Rupsetar, Gokarneshwor Municipality-1 for 10 litres of drinking water. Moreover, they have to allocate up to two hours waiting for their turn to fetch the water.
Sometimes, the queue already goes long whenever she reaches the tap.
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